Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to manually operated mechanisms controlling the opening or closing of electric switching members (on-off switches, etc.), especially circuit breakers.
These mechanisms in general make it possible to perform switching in one direction by pushing-in a control button and to disengage switching in the other direction by acting either on the same control button or on another button.
In the case of circuit breakers, disengagement in the other direction, when the same button is used, is theoretically achieved by pulling on the pushed-in button; the pulled-out position is in any case the one to which the button returns automatically when the circuit is broken. However, in the case of on-off switches, disengagement usually is achieved by pushing the pushed-in button in again, the button then coming free and being able to return to its position of rest (push-button action).
Under certain conditions, these types of action are not the most practical to use and it may be preferable, for example, for disengagement of a circuit breaker to be achieved by pushing the pushed-in button in again. This is the case, for example, with circuit breakers placed in a very confined space such as the cockpit of an aircraft. However, the solution that consists in replacing within a circuit breaker the button that can be disengaged by pulling with a pushbutton of the "on-off switch" type is only partially satisfactory because it entails a movement that is the opposite of what the user is accustomed to performing in the case of a circuit breaker.